La Blasa's Tavern.
The frequent quarrels between Leandro and his sweetheart, the
Corrector's daughter, very often gave the neighbours of the Corrala
food for gossip. Leandro was an ill-tempered, quarrelsome sort; his
brutal instincts were quickly awakened; despite his habit of going
every Saturday night to the taverns and restaurants, ready for a
rumpus with the bullies and the ruffians, he had thus far managed to
steer clear of any disagreeable accident. His sweetheart was somewhat
pleased with this display of valour; her mother, however, regarded it
with genuine indignation, and was forever advising her daughter to
dismiss her Leandro for good.
The girl would dismiss her lover; but afterwards, when he returned in
humility, ready to accede to any conditions, she relented.
This confidence in her power turned the girl despotic, whimsical,
voluble; she would amuse herself by rousing Leandro's jealousy; she
had arrived at a particular state, a blend of affection and hatred, in
which the affection remained within and the hatred outside, revealing
itself in a ferocious cruelty, in the satisfaction of mortifying her
lover constantly.
"What you ought to do some fine day," Señor Ignacio would say to
Leandro, incensed by the cruel coquetry of the maiden, "is to get her
into a corner and take all you want.... And then give her a beating
and leave her soft as mush. The next day she'd be following you around
like a dog."
Leandro, as brave as any bully, was as meek as a charity-pupil in the
presence of his sweetheart. At times he recalled his father's counsel,
but he would never have summoned the courage to carry it through.
One Saturday afternoon, after a bitter dispute with Milagros, Leandro
invited Manuel to make the rounds that night together with him.
"Where'll we go?" asked Manuel.
"To the Naranjeros café, or to the Engrima restaurant."
"Wherever you please."
"We'll make the rounds of those dives and then we'll wind up at La
Blasa's tavern."
"Do the hard guys go there?"
"I should say. As tough as you make 'em."
"Then I'll let Roberto know,--that fellow who came for me to take him
to la Doctrina."
"All right."
After work Manuel went off to the boardingrhouse and took counsel with
Roberto.
"Be at the San Millán café about nine in the evening," said Roberto,
"I'll be there with a cousin of mine."
"Are you going to take her there?" Manuel asked in astonishment.
"Yes. She's a queer one, a painter."
"And is this painter good-looking?" asked Leandro.
"I can't say. I don't know her."
"Damn my sweet---- ... ! I'd give anything to have this woman come
along, man."
"Me, too."
They both went to the San Millán café, sat down and waited
impatiently. At the hour indicated Roberto appeared in company of his
cousin whom he called Fanny. She was a woman between thirty and forty,
very slender, with a sallow complexion,--a distinguished, masculine
type; there was about her something of the graceless beauty of a
racehorse; her nose was curved, her jaw big, her cheeks sunken and her
eyes grey and cold. She wore a jacket of dark green taffeta, a black
skirt and a small hat.
Leandro and Manuel greeted her with exceeding timidity and
awkwardness; they shook hands with Roberto and conversed.
"My cousin," said Roberto, "would like to see something of slum life
hereabouts."
"Whenever you wish," answered Leandro. "But I warn you beforehand that
there are some pretty tough specimens in this vicinity."
"Oh, I'm prepared," said the lady, with a slight foreign accent,
showing a revolver of small calibre.
Roberto paid, despite Leandro's protests, and they left the café.
Coming out on the Plaza del Rastro, they walked down the Ribera de
Curtidores as far as the Ronda de Toledo.
"If the lady wishes to see the house we live in, this is the one,"
said Leandro.
They went into the Corralón; a crowd of gamins and old women, amazed
to see such a strange woman there at such an hour, surrounded them,
showering Manuel and Leandro with questions. Leandro was eager for
Milagros to learn that he had been there with a woman, so he
accompanied Fanny through the place, pointing out all the holes of the
wretched dwelling.
"Poverty's the only thing you can see here," said Leandro.
"Yes, yes indeed," answered the woman.
"Now if you wish, we'll go to La Blasa's tavern."
They left the Corralón for Embajadores lane and walked along the black
fence of a laundry. It was a dark night and a drizzle had begun to
fall. They stumbled along the surrounding path.
"Look-out," said Leandro. "There's a wire here."
He stepped upon the wire to hold it down. They all crossed the path
and passed a group of white houses, coming to Las Injurias.
They approached a low cottage with a dark socle; a door with clouded
broken panes stuffed with bundles of paper, through which shone a
pallid light, gave entrance to the dwelling. In the opaque
transparency of the glass appeared from time to time the shadow of a
person.
Leandro opened the door and they all went in. A stuffy, smoky wave of
atmosphere struck them in the face. A kerosene lamp, hanging from the
ceiling and covered with a white shade, provided light for the tiny,
low-roofed tavern.
As the four entered, the customers greeted them with an expression of
stupefaction; for a while the habituées whispered among themselves,
then some, resumed their playing as others looked on.
Fanny, Roberto, Leandro and Manuel took seats to the right of the
door.
"What'll you have?" asked the woman at the counter.
"Four fifteen-céntimo glasses of wine."
The woman brought the glasses in a filthy tray, and set them upon the
table. Leandro pulled out sixty céntimos.
"They're ten apiece," corrected the woman in ill-humoured tones.
"How's that?"
"Because this is outside the limits."
"All right; take whatever it comes to."
The woman left twenty céntimos on the table and returned to the
counter. She was broad, large-breasted, with a head that set deep in
between her shoulders and a neck composed of some five or six
layers of fat; from time to time she would serve a drink, always getting
the price in advance; she spoke very little, with evident displeasure
and with an invariable gesture of ill-humour.
This human hippopotamus had at her right a tin tank with a spigot, for
brandy, and at her left a flask of strong wine and a chipped jar
covered with a black funnel, into which she poured whatever was left
in the glasses by her customers.
Roberto's cousin fished out a phial of smelling salts, hid it in her
clamped hand and took a sniff from time to time.
Opposite the place where Roberto, Fanny, Leandro and Manuel were
seated, a crowd of some twenty men were packed around a table playing
cane.
Near them, huddled on the floor next the stove, reclining against the
wall, could be seen a number of ugly, scraggly-haired hags, dressed in
corsages and ragged skirts that were tied around their waists by
ropes.
"Who are those women?" asked the painter.
"They're old tramps," explained Leandro. "The kind that go to the
Botanical Garden and the clearings outside the city."
Two or three of the unfortunates held in their arms children belonging
to other women who had come there to spend the night; some were dozing
with their cigarettes sticking from the corner of their mouths. Amid
the old women were a few little girls of thirteen or fourteen,
monstrously deformed, with bleary eyes; one of them had her nose
completely eaten away, with nothing but a hole like a wound left in
its place; another was hydro-cephalous, with so thin a neck that it
seemed the slightest movement would snap it and send her head rolling
from her shoulders.
"Have you seen the large jars they have here?" Leandro asked Manuel.
"Come on and take a look."
The two rose and approached the group of gamblers. One of these
interrupted his game.
"Please make way?" Leandro said to him, with marked impertinence.
The man drew in his chair sourly. There was nothing remarkable about
the jars; they were large, embedded in the wall, painted with
red-lead; each of them bore a sign denoting the class of wine inside,
and had a spigot.
"What's so wonderful about this, I'd like to know?" asked Manuel.
Leandro smiled; they returned as they had come, disturbing the player
once more and resuming their seats at the table.
Roberto and Fanny conversed in English.
"That fellow we made get up," said Leandro, "is the bully of this
place."
"What's his name?" asked Fanny.
"El Valencia."
The man they were speaking about, hearing his sobriquet mentioned,
turned around and eyed Leandro; for a moment their glances crossed
defiantly; Valencia turned his eyes away and continued playing. He was
a strong man, about forty, with high cheek bones, reddish skin and a
disagreeably sarcastic expression. Every once in a while he would cast
a severe look at the group formed by Fanny, Roberto and the other two.
"And that Valencia,--who is he?" asked the lady in a low voice.
"He's a mat maker by trade," answered Leandro, raising his voice. "A
tramp that wheedles money out of low-lives; before he used to belong
to the _pote_,--the kind that visit houses on Sundays, knock, and
when they see nobody's home, stick their jimmy into the lock and
zip!... But he hasn't the courage even for this, 'cause his liver is
whiter than paper."
"It would be curious to investigate," said Roberto, "just how far
poverty has served as centre of gravity for the degradation of these
men."
"And how about that white-bearded old fellow at his side?" asked
Fanny.
"He's one of those apostles that cure with water. They say he's a wise
old fellow.... He has a cross on his tongue. But I believe he painted
it there himself."
"And that other woman there?"
"That's La Paloma, Valencia's mistress."
"Prostitute?" asked the lady.
"For at least forty years," answered Leandro with a laugh.
They all looked closely at Paloma; she had a huge, soft face, with
pouches of violet skin, and a timid look as of a humble beast; she
represented at least forty years of prostitution and all its
concomitant ills; forty years of nights spent in the open, lurking
about barracks, sleeping in suburban shanties and the most repulsive
lodgings.
Among the women there was also a gypsy who, from time to time, would
get up and walk across the tavern with a saucy strut.
Leandro ordered some glasses of whiskey; but it was so bad that nobody
could drink it.
"Hey, you," called Leandro to the gipsy, offering her the glass. "Want
a drink?"
"No."
The gypsy placed her hands upon the table,--a pair of stubby, wrinkled
hands incrusted with dirt.
"Who are these gumps?" she asked Leandro.
"Friends of mine. Will you drink or not?" and he offered her the glass
again.
"No."
Then in a shrill voice, he shouted:
"Apostle, will you have a drink?"
The Apostle rose from his place amongst the gamblers. He was dead
drunk and could hardly move; his eyes were viscous, like those of an
angered animal; he staggered over to Leandro and took the glass, which
trembled in his grasp; he brought it to his lips and gulped it down.
"Want more?" asked the gypsy.
"Sure, sure," he drooled.
Then he began to babble, showing the stumps of his yellow teeth, but
nobody could understand a word; he drained the other glasses, rested
his forehead against his hand and slowly made his way to a corner,
into which he squatted, and then stretched himself out on the floor.
"Do you want me to tell your fortune, princess?" asked the gipsy of
Fanny, seizing her hand.
"No," replied the lady drily.
"Won't you give me a few coins for the _churumbeles_?"
"No."
"Wicked woman! Why won't you give me a few coins for the
_churumbeles_?"
"What does _churumbeles_ mean?" asked the lady.
"Her children," answered Leandro, laughing.
"Have you children?" Fanny asked the gipsy.
"Yes."
"How many?"
"Two. Here they are."
And the gipsy fetched a blond little fellow and a girl of about five
or six.
The lady petted the little boy; then she took a duro from her purse
and gave it to the gipsy.
The gipsy, parting her lips in amazement and bursting forth into
profuse flattery, exhibited the duro to everybody in the place.
"We'd better be going," advised Leandro. "To pull one of those big
coins out in a dive like this is dangerous."
The four left the tavern.
"Would you like to make the rounds of this quarter?" asked Leandro.
"Yes. Let's," said the lady.
Together they wound in and out of the narrow lanes of Las Injurias.
"Watch out, the drain runs in the middle of the street," cautioned
Manuel.
The rain kept falling; the quartet of slummers entered narrow patios
where their feet sank into the pestiferous slime. Along the entire
extension of the ravine black with mud, shone but a single oil lamp,
attached to the side of some half crumbled wall.
"Shall we go back?" asked Roberto.
"Yes," answered the lady.
They set out for Embajadores lane and walked up the Paseo de las
Acacias. The rain came down harder; here and there a faint light shone
in the distance; against the intense darkness of the sky loomed the
vague silhouette of a high chimney....
Leandro and Manuel accompanied Fanny and Roberto as far as the Plaza
del Rastro, and there they parted, exchanging handshakes.
"What a woman!" exclaimed Leandro.
"Nice, eh?" asked Manuel.
"You bet. I'd give anything to have a try at her."